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The Haunted Librarian

~ Researching, investigating, and writing about the paranormal.

The Haunted Librarian

Category Archives: Universities

Tulane University’s Two Mummies Have Attended 3 Super Bowl Games

14 Monday Feb 2022

Posted by The Haunted Librarian in Mummies, Museums, Not Haunted, Not Haunted--But Cool, Universities

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Tags

Egyptian mummies, George Gliddon, Panorama of the Nile, Tulane University


Tulane University hosted 3 Super Bowl games: IV in 1970, VI in 1972, and IX in 1975. The crowds of 80,000+ people never knew that underneath the bleachers tucked in a storage room were two Egyptian mummies. Theirs was a lurid story.

George Robbins Gliddon (1809-1857) was the former US vice consul in Egypt. He fashioned himself an Egyptologist and assembled the “Gliddon’s Transparent Panorama of the Nile” exhibit that traveled the United States in the mid-1800s. The panorama was a beautifully illustrated painting that measured 900 feet long and 9 feet high. Gliddon was a master salesman and signed up subscribers who funded his traveling show. These subscribers attended mummy unwrapping parties, where Gliddon unwrapped a mummy and displayed any funerary items contained within the coffins.

While in Boston, Gliddon, who prided himself on his ability to translate hieroglyphics, misidentified one of the mummies. He claimed that the mummy contained in the case was a female of noble lineage. He claimed she was a high priestess or of that level. Unfortunately, upon the reveal, the mummy was most certainly a male. His erect penis had been carefully wrapped. Gliddon talked himself out of this uncomfortable situation and planned his exit from the field. He shortened his traveling itinerary, making New Orleans his final stop.

Flyer for Gliddon’s traveling show.

Gliddon arrived in March of 1852. He opened his show at Tulane University. He unwrapped the second mummy, that of a female, at what is now Gallier Hall. When the show closed, Gliddon donated the mummies to Tulane. He attempted to sell the vast panorama, even suggesting it be divided into 50-foot sections; however, it probably didn’t sell. There aren’t any records as to its fate. Thanks to Tulane’s football stadium’s demolition, we now know what happened to the two mummies.

Tulane’s former stadium was a popular venue. The Third Tulane Stadium, as it was known, was built in 1926 with a capacity of 35,000. Four expansions followed with capacity reaching 80,985 in 1955. On July 17, 1976, ZZ Top performed to a raucous audience which led to the university banning all concerts inside the stadium. (The ban remains in effect) The stadium became known as the Sugar Bowl, based on its form as resembling a sugar bowl lid, and the Queen of Southern Stadiums. Professional and college football teams played there up until 1979.

Sections of the stadium were declared unsafe, and demolition commenced on November 18, 1979. Demolition finished in June of 1980. It was during the early stages of demolition that the mummies were discovered ensconced in glass cases sitting above their coffins.

Images of the former Tulane University stadium.


The mummies were displayed initially in a museum at the university’s medical school. Next stop was the museum of natural history in Gibson Hall. That museum closed in 1955, and the mummies were placed into storage, underneath the stadium. Somehow, they ended up at a Charity Hospital museum and then to a physician’s home. (Not sure I would take them home) They were then placed back in storage until their discovery. They were kept in the Howard-Tilton Memorial Library basement until 1979, when they relocated to their final resting place: Dinwiddie Hall in the Department of Anthropology.

Tulane Museum of Anatomy and an image of the male priest.


University professors, along with graduate students, have learned a lot about the mummies. The male’s case had his name inscribed. It is often written as Djed-Thoth-iu-ef-ankh or “Thoth says that he will live.” He was a priest and “overseer of artisans” at the Temple of Amun in Thebes. He suffered from dental decay and spinal issues. He was around 50 when he died and was embalmed.

Initially, Gibbons, among others, believed that the female was Djed-Mut-iu-es-ankh; however, her skull is housed at Penn Museum at the University of Pennsylvania. At some unknown time, this 13.5-15.5-year-old female was placed inside the other’s case. Even though she is better preserved, little is known about her.

More has been discovered about George Gliddon. Some Edgar Allan Poe scholars have theorized that Gliddon was the inspiration for Doctor Ponnonner in Poe’s satirical short story “Some Words with a Mummy,” first published in April 1945. The main character procured a mummy and plans to unwrap it at his home in front a of few friends in the name of “scientific discovery.” The inept doctor instead revives the mummy they christen Allamistakeo. The story centers around Egyptian mummy mania that captured the imaginations of people in Europe and the United States.

Tragedy did not escape Gliddon in real life. He abandoned his research in Egyptology and shifted, instead, to proving polygenism, the belief that each race came from a distinct, individual source. (It is racist conjecture and shunned by science and scientific communities) Gliddon was in Panama in 1857 where he contracted Yellow Fever. He died before reaching the age of 50.

Ultimately, the Tulane mummies are more interesting. While visiting the university, I will attempt to visit them. I’ll post images if I am successful.

The Bye Bye Man: First Horror Film of 2017

04 Wednesday Jan 2017

Posted by The Haunted Librarian in Books, Colleges & Universities, Conspiracy Theories, Demonic Possession, Ghost Stories, Horror Movies, Movie Reviews, Movies, Ouija Boards, Paranormal, Uncategorized, Universities, Urban Legends

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blind albino orphan, bye bye man, robert damon schneck, the bridge to body island

byebyemanposter

Movie Poster.

The Bye Bye Man: First Horror Film of 2017

Tagline: Don’t think it; don’t say it.

Time to blame the Ouija Board. Again. The Bye Bye Man (2017) debuts on Friday the 13th, January 2017. It is the first horror movie of 2017 (Amityville: The Awakening was moved from January 6 until June). The trailer portrays a menacing creature who is a cross between Candyman and Slender Man, two contrived characters to seem like an urban legend. The Bye Bye Man media package wants viewers to believe this is based on a true story. That would be a stretch.

byebyemanbook

Republished book cover.

Robert Damon Schneck published The President’s Vampire: Strange-But-True Tales of the United States of America, a collection of short tales, in 2005. It has been republished as The Bye Bye Man: And Other Strange-But-True Tales coinciding with the movie. The movie builds off of the short story “The Bridge to Body Island,” set in the 1990s when three college students move into a house and discover a cursed Ouija Board. Of course they begin to experiment with the board and eek out the story of an abandoned blind albino boy born in rural Louisiana and left on the stoop of an orphanage. The boy, ultimately known as “The Bye Bye Man,” escapes the orphanage traveling vagabond style leaving corpses in his wake. He pines for a “friend” and begins sewing eyes and a tongue together. The creature sets the “friend” down so it may identify the next victim. The doll whistles when a victim is found. The urban legend stops shortly after this and the movie presumably picks up the tale.

The trailer and brief write-ups describe the plot as a mesh of Ouija Board antics, tied to a creature who comes when his name is called or thought (hence the Candyman reference), photobombing pictures like Slender Man, and then leading to possession. Originally rated R, the movie is PG-13. The production budget is $6 million, making it a low-budget movie, but certainly not fatal for a horror movie. Stay tuned for my review after opening weekend. In the meantime…don’t think his name, nor dare say it.

The Bye Bye Man

Kim stands in front of the train.

Cancellations Blow!

02 Tuesday Sep 2014

Posted by The Haunted Librarian in Famous Locations, Ghost Hunting, Ghost Tours, Radio Show, Residences, Sports Related, Universities

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Tags

archer paranormal investigations, archer paranormal radio, drones, gator football, haunted dalton, uf, university of florida

UF Rain Delay

UF Rain Delay

Cancellations Blow

Client cancellations are inevitable. For the Labor Day weekend API (Archer Paranormal Investigations, www.archer-pi.com), suffered not one, not two, but three cancellations.

Originally the API Gals were heading to Dalton, Georgia as special guests on the Haunted Dalton Tour. Scheduling challenges occurred, and the tour was re-scheduled for this Saturday, September 6th. Check out https://www.facebook.com/HauntedDaltonGeorgia for more information.

API scheduled a huge—and I mean huge—investigation complete with drone footage and the latest tools and cameras. This was big. Lots of activity. Great history. Gorgeous plantation house. Unfortunately the client was injured in a car accident and had to postpone.

API quickly lined up another investigation at a residence south of Atlanta. Again. Another cancellation.

Holiday weekends seem ideal for investigations. For a paranormal team it provides another recovery day. Investigation hangovers blow. However, homeowners rarely think it through and often cancel because they want to enjoy the holiday. Alone. Or out of town. Scheduling residential investigations over a holiday weekend doesn’t make sense. Instead, paranormal teams should only schedule business locations over three day weekends.

Cancellations happen. I understand. I take them as signs that I’ll collect better evidence next time. So I spent my Saturday trolling TV for college football games waiting for the UF kick-off at 7 pm. Of course, there’s a rain delay. After three hours, I got another cancellation. Ugh!

Duke University. What happened?

30 Sunday Mar 2014

Posted by The Haunted Librarian in Famous Locations, Famous People, Research, Universities

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duke parapsychology lab, jb rhine, research, rhine institute, stacy horn, unbelievable, william mcdougall

ESP Duke Parapsychology Lab

Participants are tested for ESP at the Duke Parapsychology Laboratory.

Duke University. What happened?

With Mercer’s Cinderella performance against Duke University in college basketball, I wondered: What happened? March Madness aside, I’m still curious. How did one of the most prestigious parapsychology laboratories lose favor? However, public interest still grows.

Duke Parapsychology Lab

Original home for the lab.

Starting in the 1930s, major colleges and universities in the United States and Great Britain opened research laboratories focusing on different aspects of parapsychology. One of the most well-known was the facility housed at Duke. In 1935, J.B. Rhine and William McDougall started the Duke Parapsychology Laboratory. For the next three decades the lab received substantial private funding and enjoyed the support of the university. However, by the early sixties, funding sources dried up and academic scrutiny displaced the lab and it moved off of the college campus. Seems the heyday of parapsychological research ended. But had it really?

According to Glen McDonald’s article “Whatever Happened to Parapsychology?” (http://news.discovery.com/human/psychology/whatever-happened-to-parasychology-1306241.htm) public interest remains high. Further, research continues. The Rhine Research Center (current name of the former lab) continues Dr. Rhine’s mission but works with substantially less staff, funding, and academic support. The skeptics are incredibly vocal and better work the media than the parapsychology academics. And academic skeptics are particularly pesky. They claim that since experiments cannot be consistently repeated in controlled conditions, ESP and the like cannot exist. It’s plain tomfoolery to them.

Dr. Rhine died in 1980 without any breakthrough in research. This week news outlets reported that scientists had established “mind reading.” Brain scanners were used to recreate images that participants were thinking. Gee, that sure sounds closely related to ESP.

Duke Parapsychology Lab

Group photograph of the staff at the Duke Parapsychology Laboratory.

Duke University made a mistake pushing Rhine and his research off the college grounds. Had the school rode the 60s wave and ignored the naysayers, parapsychological research would be further along. As it is, fewer institutes are making strides in the field. Yet, some of cable television’s highest rated shows have some paranormal or parapsychological aspect. The public craves more. We shouldn’t leave it up to “reality tv” to advance the field.

Side note: Stacy Horn has penned a wonderfully dense book about the Duke Parapsychology Laboratory titled Unbelievable: Investigations into Ghosts, Poltergeists, Telepathy, and Other Unseen Phenomena, from the Duke Parapsychology Laboratory (HarperCollins, 2009). It’s not beach reading; however, it effectively captures the essence of lab’s history and parapsychology’s place in modern science. Worth the read!

For those seeking the “quick” version, see Horn’s blog http://www.echonyc.com/~horn/unbelievable/. It is chalked full of information and pictures.

 

This Week on Archer Paranormal Radio

11 Tuesday Mar 2014

Posted by The Haunted Librarian in Conferences, Famous Locations, Ghost Hunting, Hospitals, Hotels & Motels, Live Paranormal, Paranormal, Radio Show, Universities

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Tags

Ghost Hunting, ghostock, hotels, sanatorium, unmarked graves, waverley hills, waverly hills

Waverly Hills Sanatorium

Waverly Hills Sanatorium

This week on the Archer Paranormal Radio:

1. Owners of Waverly Hills Sanatorium want to convert it to a 4-star hotel. Would you book a room?

2. In the News: Lost to History. University discovers 2,000+ unmarked graves in construction expansion.

3. Parting thoughts from GhoStock 2014.

4. Why attending paranormal conferences enhances your education.

Tune in to Archer Paranormal Radio every Thursday evening at 7 pm EST on www.liveparanormal.com.

Lost to History

09 Sunday Mar 2014

Posted by The Haunted Librarian in Cemeteries, Hospitals, Radio Show, Universities

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

asylum, kirkbride plan, unmarked graves

Mississippi State Lunatic Asylum

Mississippi State Lunatic Asylum

Lost to History

Abandoned cemeteries are lost to history. I’ve previously blogged on this topic; however, the subject-matter has made headlines in the past month. The University of Mississippi Medical Center broke ground for an expansion and discovered the mother lode of coffins. Before it was not uncommon for construction workers to uncover a few gravesites. In fact, this university has had its fair share of discoveries, but the numbers hovered well below 100. This recent discovery is in the thousands—roughly 2,000 unmarked pauper-type coffins.

History: The Mississippi State Lunatic Asylum was constructed based on the Kirkbride Plan, where patient areas were to be bright and open. The facility opened on January 8, 1855. One hundred and fifty (150) patients were housed there then. In 1892, a fire broke out; however, only one person was killed. The Kirkbride Plan was abandoned at the turn of the century. At its peak, the asylum housed over 2,500 patients—well above the proscribed limits of care. The facility was antiquated and lacked sufficient funding when it closed in 1935. The building was demolished in 1954.

Kirkbride Plan

Kirkbride Plan

Questions quickly mounted as who were these people and where did they come from. Historians dismissed the possibility of Civil War soldiers being buried there. Although the institute was seized and the property pilfered, the area did not see significant battle. State archives also eliminated the possibility that it was a slave cemetery.

A team of anthropologists determined that the graves were connected to the asylum because the remains lacked personal effects. The bodies were either pitched into the wooden coffins in the nude or with a simple shroud. Initially, the number of coffins was estimated at 1,000. Ground-penetrating radar was used to survey the area. More coffins were discovered. Today the number sits at 2,000.

Re-interment of the bodies is cost prohibited. Officials state that the cost would surpass $3 million dollars. For the time being, the bodies will remain where they are. The expansion project has been halted while another viable location is identified. But ancestors are still seeking answers.

Although the building is gone, the asylum records remain. The state archive has 16 bound volumes of handwritten records detailing every patient. Digitizing the records will take years. Some answers will have to wait.

 

Unmarked Graves

Unmarked Graves

 

The Most Exclusive Section

25 Wednesday Sep 2013

Posted by The Haunted Librarian in Cemeteries, Civil War, Georgia Statesmen, Historic Oakland Cemetery, Leo Frank, Sports Related, Universities

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Tags

conf. gen. hood, georgia tech, governor slaton, grant field, john grant

Grant Mausoleum Block 57 Eclectic 1888

Grant Mausoleum
Block 57 Eclectic 1888

The Bell Tower Ridge

The Bell Tower Ridge is by far the most sought after area of the cemetery. The land is the second highest naturally occurring point in Atlanta. The panoramic views are stunning. As are the elaborate mausoleums the surround the Bell Tower.

During the Civil War, James Williams owned a two-story house in this section. As the “Battle of Atlanta” was raging, Confederate General John B. Hood stood watch from this vantage point. An historic marker denotes the location.

One of the most elegant–and costly–mausoleums belongs to the Grant Family. John T. Grant (d. 1887) made his fortune building railroad lines. His grandson, John W. Grant (1867-1938) was a banker and real estate developer. John W.’s grandson, Hugh Inman Grant died at the age of 11. To honor Hugh’s memory, John W. donated the money to build a football stadium at Georgia Tech. Originally named Grant Field, the stadium is now called the Bobby Dodd Stadium in Historic Grant Field.

The family mausoleum houses a number of people. The most notable is John Slaton (d. 1955) former Georgia Governor who commuted the death sentence of Leo Frank, the man convicted of killing 13-year-old Mary Phagan. (See the Marietta City and Confederate Section for a discussion). Gov. Slaton married into the Grant family and was given a plot.

Investigation: On my first visit to Oakland and before I toured the mausoleums in this area, I received several words on my Ghost Radar: score, involved, draw, play, Europe, football, rapidly, and orange.

It was only after I went home and researched that particular area did I find a possibly connection. However, subsequent visits have not produced any communication. None. Therefore, I cannot conclusively state that these words came from the Grant Mausoleum. It makes a great story, though.

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Archer Paranormal Investigations

Archer Paranormal Investigations

The Haunted Librarian

Gainesville, Florida

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